


The Swan-Mills Family (Christmas) Adventures

by fireroasted



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Family Feels, Fluff, oneshotcollection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-19
Updated: 2017-12-23
Packaged: 2019-02-16 22:59:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13063950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fireroasted/pseuds/fireroasted
Summary: A collection of Swan-Mills family moments.





	1. The Swan-Mills Family Goes to the Mall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Eoxie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eoxie/gifts).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The mall Santa story.

Regina Mills hated the mall.

All these bodies pushing past her in every direction, all this air she had to _share_. She couldn’t imagine why anybody would put themselves through this misery on purpose, but then again—telling by some of the gaunt faces shouldering her out of the way—many likely shared her sentiments. She glanced up warily at the giant, sparkling snowflake hanging in the atrium, and tightened her grip on Henry’s hand.

Henry’s wide eyes couldn’t stay still. The colourful decorations, the ribbons, the fake leaves, the fake snow—everything about this utterly unnecessary holiday captured her son’s attention. And she would never have stood for it had he not looked so damn cute in his plaid bowtie.

To some degree, she could understand his enthusiasm for the holiday. It was a rare time for families to be together, to celebrate, and bask in the magic of the wintertime. But, god _damn_ , what was the point of all these disgruntled parents and half-way skeptical children lining up to take pictures with a stranger in a Santa suit?

Regina shook her head and tried to drown out all the noise around her as she joined the queue, Henry quietly bouncing with excitement around her. “How are you feeling, dear?” she asked with a smile.

Henry grinned—and, oh, how she loved the toothy, free grin that made everything worth it in the end. “We’re finally going to have a picture with Santa, Mom!” He hesitated for a moment, a blush spreading to the tips of his ears as he considered his next words. “I mean, I know Santa isn’t real and all, but we’re going to have a picture together, and—Oh! It’s Ma! It’s Ma!” His moment of demure maturity quickly passed as he tugged at Regina’s arm excitedly, and pointed to a woman in the crowd making her way through.

Regina stayed in line, feigning disinterest, when he let go of her fingers and darted toward the woman in red—not out of place in her leather jacket for once amidst the rest of the holiday decorations.

“Ma!”

The woman caught the boy in both arms. “Hey, kid!” she laughed. “Ready to meet Santa?” She held his hand and led him toward Regina. As if it was the most natural gesture in the world, Henry reached for Regina’s hand with his free one.

Regina gave her son an affectionate smile before looking up to meet the other woman’s eyes. “You’re late, Miss Swan,” she said.

Emma scoffed. “I’ve missed you too, Regina.”

“I saw you this morning,” Regina returned with a quirk of the brow.

“Oh, yes”—Emma waggled her eyebrows—"I remember this morning.”

Regina rolled her eyes, a flash of a smile gracing her features before the stoic features returned.  Emma could not help noticing the vein in her forehead pulsing, and briefly wondered if she was the sole cause. Her theory was confirmed when Regina looked away, reddened at the ears as she mumbled, “You’re an idiot, Emma.”

“I’m your idiot,” Emma said with a triumphant smirk, “And you love it.”

But Regina could not be moved. Naturally, Emma had to let go of Henry’s hand for a moment, had to reached around behind him to touch Regina’s cheek. Pressing her fingertips lightly against her jaw, she tilted her face toward her to plant a kiss on her pouting lips. “Better now?” she said, retrieving Henry’s hand once more.

“Much,” Regina whispered.

“No more grumpy-grumps?” Emma cooed.

Regina cleared her throat and straightened her back for good measure. “No more grumpy-grumps,” she muttered quickly, inciting a burst of laughter from Emma—and god _damn_ it she would burn everything to the ground if she didn’t love that sound so much.

Henry glanced between his two mothers, a slow smile spreading on his lips.

Emma nudged him with their intertwined hands. “What are you smiling at, kid?”

His eyes glittered into Regina’s then Emma’s. “Maybe I don’t need Santa pictures, after all.” At the look of concern flashing over both women’s features, he simply shrugged. “I already got what I want for Christmas.”


	2. Auntie Zelena Visits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ugly Christmas sweater story.

Zelena stood on the front steps of the Swan-Mills family home. She felt the heft of the champagne bottle in her hands, and rolled her eyes several times to get it out of the way—she had promised to be nice, after all—before ringing the doorbell. Her sister, Regina, had pleaded (threatened) for her to rein back her sarcasm several notches for the holiday season, and while she had no plans to ever give her sister what she wanted, she could afford to roll her eyes a little less.

That was, until she rang the doorbell—a metallic, nerve-grating, rendition of Jingle Bells seemed to shake the neighbourhood. “What the bloody hell is that?” Zelena muttered out loud. Suddenly, turning around and going home to enjoy this wonderfully large bottle of champagne on her own seemed like a rather splendid idea.

But a patter of feet soon darted up to the door, and little Henry appeared, his smile wide as the white of his Santa hat fell over one eye. “Auntie Zelena!”

“Hullo, poppet,” she said, pulling him into a one-armed hug. “My god. What on _earth_ are you bloody wearing? That jumper is absolutely _horrendous_.”

Henry pulled down the hem of his sweater and glanced down at the red ‘H’ crookedly cut and sewn onto the deep green and brown sweater. He sighed, looked guiltily behind him, then quickly ushered Zelena out the door. “Between you and me…” he began, taking the champagne bottle from his aunt.

“It’s atrocious, Henry.”

Henry bit his lip. “I know, but…well, you can’t say anything.”

Zelena held both hands at her hips. “I think that sweater bloody well speaks for itself. Something along the lines of, ‘Please set fire on me and put me out of my bloody misery!’”

“Aunt Zelena…”

Then it dawned on her. “That’s not the only one, is it?”

Henry shook his head. “Ma made one for everyone. She…worked really hard on them, so you absolutely can’t say anything, okay? You’ll hurt her feelings. And Mom will kill you if you hurt Ma’s feelings.”

“I’m sorry, love, but surely my frigid sister wouldn’t—”

Just then, Regina’s voice rang through the hall. “Zelena,” she called, “is that you?”

“Oh, dear god,” Zelena breathed.

Henry gave Zelena one last pleading glance, and swung open the door to reveal his mother walking toward them, looking poised and elegant as ever. Even in her purple, blue, and pink sweater. She crossed her arms over the crooked white ‘R’

“My dear sister,” Zelena began, pinching the bridge of her nose, “please tell me this is a bloody nightmare. Surely such a _hideous_ piece of garment cannot _possibly_ exist in this sorry world.” Regina stared back with a raised brow. “At least tell me none of the neighbours have seen you.”

“Zelena…”

“This is ridiculous!” she cried, throwing up her hands. “You’re all mad! Stark raving bloody mad!”

“Zelena!” All eyes were in the doorway when Emma appeared, wearing a matching purple, blue, and pink sweater with a crooked white ‘E’ emblazoned on top. “Nice to see you again!” she said, grinning. If she noticed the quiet tension between them, thicker than Christmas fruitcake, she didn't show it. 

Zelana could feel Regina’s and Henry’s eyes boring into face, one significantly more threatening than the other. It was not without significant effort that she managed to return Emma’s grin with a tight-lipped smile of her own. “Chuffed,” she squeaked simply.

When Emma disappeared again, she narrowed her eyes at Regina. “You fools make me bloody sick,” she muttered as she pushed through the doorway.  

As Zelena passed through the foyer, she was sure the amount of bright decorations, ribbons, and overall _festivity_ would blind her by the end of the night. Secretly, deep, deep, _deep_ down she could admit that she was happy for her sister and her little family, but— _god_ , was this necessary? Just as she had readied a deliciously snide comment on her tongue, she stepped into the living room, and all words failed her when she saw what Emma was holding up.

An orange, red, and green sweater, with a neon green ‘Z’. It was the worst one of the lot—Zelena could see the ragged lines of every cut and poorly sewn line, the hot glue seeping out of the ‘Z’ like a bloody crime scene. She held her breath.

“Merry Christmas!” Emma said cheerily, “An early Christmas present from the Swan-Mills family.”

Zelena laughed uneasily. She was about to say something when she felt the presence of Regina and Henry close behind her like a warning. They were watching her, waiting for her to make the right move. Zelena swallowed, and resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

“Chuffed.”


	3. The Swan-Mills Family Makes Snowflakes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emma and Regina cut out snowflakes for Henry.

It was a cold winter morning when Regina Mills walked into the living room and nearly dropped her mug of tea. She had every intention of cuddling up with Emma and a nice book, but...

 “Miss Swan,” She churned out between gritted teeth, “what is the meaning of this?”

Her arm swept through the air in an unabashedly accusing gesture. Emma, resting comfortably on the couch with a stack of paper in her lap, raised both hands, a pair of safety scissors hanging from her index finger. In spite of the many, many shards of paper—too free-spirited to fall into the wastebasket—strewn all about her, Emma did not seem to notice a problem with this picture.

An open pencil case sat on the coffee table on top of another precariously arranged stack of paper, a chewed-up yellow pencil and a brand new ruler poking out of the zipper. Discarded strips and hidden fragments made their home on the coffee table, the couch, the carpet—Regina’s pristine living room was a veritable mess.

“Relax, I’m just making snowflakes, babe,” Emma said coolly. Her foot nudged the box resting beside the couch labelled “Student Council”.

Regina took a breath. “So it’s for Henry,” she said, shoulders relaxing as she took a seat on the opposite end of the couch with her mug. She groaned when Emma resumed her cutting. “Must you make such a mess, dear? Or have you not quite developed your motor skills yet.”

Emma stuck out a tongue. “I’m a bit too old for student council, don’t you think?” She said instead. “Bet it’d be fun though.”

Regina scoffed. “You’d probably mandate something ridiculous and get kicked out in a day.”

“I don’t know,” Emma said, looking up with a lopsided grin that she knew Regina secretly adored, “Pants-free Friday would be a pretty good idea.”

Regina rolled her eyes and ignored her. “What on earth are you doing with those scissors? Are you even thinking about how you’re cutting?”

Emma raised a brow in challenge, then unfolded the snowflake in her hand to reveal an admittedly charming snowflake. Except—

“It’s square,” Regina deadpanned.

Emma frowned.

“It’s cute, dear,” Regina added quickly, “but its square.”

Emma picked up a second piece of paper. “But this is how I did it when I was a kid,” she huffed. “Bet you can’t do better anyway.”

Regina slammed down her half-empty mug onto the coffee table, and grabbed a sheet of paper from beneath the pencil case. “I will make you eat your words, Swan,” she muttered.

Emma, though unprepared for the sudden fervour for the art of snowflake-cutting, could not pass up the opportunity to fluster Regina. “I can think of something more delicious than that,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows.

Silence.

“You’re such an idiot.”

“Only for you, my love.”

“Why do I even keep you around?” Regina mumbled, turning away just slightly to hide the blush. She could practically hear Emma’s grin. “If you answer that, I will stab you with this disgusting pencil. Where did you even get this?”

Emma had to bite her lip to keep from laughing too hard at the flickering expressions on Regina’s face, but when Regina took both the ruler and the pencil and began measuring her snowflake, she was sure she looked even more like the ridiculous, grinning, lovesick fool she is.

“You’re so cute,” Emma said easily as she watched Regina painstakingly fold a corner over her ruler.

“Laugh now, but my perfectly proportioned snowflake will knock your socks off,” she huffed, glaring intensely at the triangular piece of paper.

Emma bit her lip. Regina’s furrowed brows, her intense concentration, the pink of her tongue poking out as she measured and stenciled out the perfect design. Not to mention the painstakingly arranged and impossibly neat pile of paper cuttings—pure art in themselves. It was enough to make Emma swoon. After all, it was in these rare and perfect mundane moments that Emma was reminded how much she loved this woman, and how much she wanted to spend her entire life listening to her stress out over the way her children’s scissors ruined the perfect symmetry she’d planned out.

“Ah-ha!” Regina cried, thirty minutes later. Her deft fingers worked to unfold her masterpiece, a victorious little smile plastered on her face. Emma wanted to squish her. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Emma hummed. “Sure is, babe.” She bit back a smile. “Only 129 more snowflakes to go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The other day I spent an afternoon at my friend’s place watching RuPaul’s Drag Race and cutting out snowflakes for my friend’s little sister for this exact reason. The winter months sure know how to bring people together!


	4. Emma and Henry’s Colouring Session

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emma and Henry have a heart-to-heart over poorly-coloured pictures.

“Ma, are you colouring?” Henry peered over Emma’s shoulder to assess her handiwork. “Frosty the Snowman isn’t red, you know. Also you are colouring reaaaally hard. You’re going to rip the paper.”

“Yes,” Emma grinded out. ”Thank you for your extremely helpful commentary, Hen.”

“Did you get this from grandma?” He said, picking up a corner of the drawing. Emma swept his hand away.

“Yes.”

“Did she tell you that colouring is relaxing?”

“Yes.”

“Are you relaxed?”

“Yes.”

“Are you lying?”

“Yes.”

“Am I annoying you?”

“Yes.”

“Do you want me to go away?”

“Yes.”

Henry pulled out a chair beside Emma at the dining table and threw himself down. From a small pile of printed paper at the centre of the table, he picked out a nice snowflake-patterned mandala and grabbed a blue crayon from the box beside Emma’s elbow.

They coloured in silence for all of two minutes before Henry piped up again—this time in a hushed conspiratorial whisper: “Are you mad at Mom?”

A pause—the red crayon finally still in Emma’s white-knuckled grip. She looked down at the red scrawl covering every inch of the snowman on her page, and sighed. “Yes.”

“Do you...want to talk about it?” The blue crayon drew reluctant circles around a smaller snowflake. Truth be told, Henry never enjoyed being the more mature one of the family, but if there was one thing he understood better than anyone else, it was the furor of his mothers’ tantrums whenever they fought.

Only three weeks ago, Henry had sat both his mothers down to give them a good, long talk about why it was not okay to set things on fire just because someone (Regina) thought someone else (Emma) smiled at the waitress for “four seconds longer than appropriate”, and why it was not okay for someone (Emma) to smash things because someone else (Regina) was “being unreasonable.” Needless to say, Henry had spent far too much time apologizing on their behalf. As grateful as he was for this family, he had to wonder sometimes what normal parents were like.

This time, Henry was determined to put out those (literal) fires before they could even begin, and Emma—scribbling away at her poor snowman—seemed like a good place to start.

“Ma?” He nudged her elbow gently, and repeated the question.

“Oh, it’s stupid,” Emma finally groaned.

“More stupid than the time Mom set your napkin on fire?”

Emma shrugged noncommittally. “Maybe the waitress was kind of cute. But no one’s as hot as Regina. Obviously. I mean, have you _seen_ her butt?”

Henry made a face. “Ew, Ma.”

“Sorry, Hen,” Emma said, ruffling his hair. “But you know what I mean. I’m lucky as hell to have her, and there isn’t a man, woman, celestial in the universe that can ever take her place.”

“So this isn’t about the last time?”

“Oh god, no. We made up that night when we—”

Henry held up a hand. “Ew, please stop. I’m too pure to hear this. Also, you’re my moms. I don’t need the pictures in my head. Again.”

Emma chuckled. “Sorry. I always get carried away, don’t I?”

Henry nodded. “Can we get back on topic? Why are you sitting here colouring by yourself?”

Emma picked up the red crayon again, and proceeded to scribble at the snow beneath Frosty. “It’s stupid,” she mumbled.

Henry pulled his chair closer and leaned into Emma. He closed his eyes and tried to find the right words. “It’s not stupid,” he said carefully, “if it makes you feel bad, Ma.”

Emma sighed, and wrapped an arm around Henry. “I just...hate...ugh...I just want to spend Christmas Eve with her. You know, as a family. I’ve...never had that before so I was looking forward to it.”

“Oh.” Henry’s heart dropped as he remembered. “Right. Mom’s working.” Over the years, he’d gotten used to it, but for some reason—maybe it was the way Emma looked now, torn between disappointment and devastation—this year hurt a lot more. He took a breath, and let the thought wash away. Emma needed him right now.

“Yeah.”

“We have Christmas Day together,” Henry added hopefully.

“Yeah…”

Just then, footsteps clacked through the hall, and into the dining room. Regina, sporting her typical fatigue-worn frown, entered the room. One hand worked at the top three buttons of her blouse, unbuttoning them as she shrugged off her jacket. Emma—momentarily forgetting her mess of emotions—watched the way each button popped open, enraptured.

“Hard day at work, Mom?” Henry’s voice brought her back down to earth, and she ducked her eyes to continue her colouring in frosty silence.

Regina rolled her eyes. “I don’t even know where to begin. What are you two up to?” She raised a brow at the veritable crime scene on Emma’s page, then glanced over at the single blue snowflake on Henry’s, but decided not to comment.

“We’re just colouring,” Henry said simply.

“Oh?”

Regina rounded the table and stood behind Emma with her hands on her hips. When Emma didn’t lift her head, she bent down to meet her eyes, albeit unsuccessfully. “I see our Miss Swan is sulking.”

Henry nodded, then, without a word, slid off his chair and left the room with both his print-out and his box of crayons, leaving Emma with the single red crayon—not that she seemed interested in anything else.

Regina pushed Emma’s chair back and kneeled down to meet her eyes. “What’s wrong, Emma?” She said softly.

“Nothing,” Emma sighed, staring down at the crayon in her hands.

“You’re pouting.”

“No,” Emma muttered, feeling very much like a child in trouble with her teacher suddenly, “I’m not.”

“Is this about Christmas Eve?”

Emma’s head snapped up. “How did you know?”

Regina reached up to cup her cheek. Though her hand was cold from the winter air, Emma instinctively leaned into it. “You underestimate me, Emma,” she said with an unfairly attractive smirk. “You don’t think I’ve learned to recognize when my Emma is a grumpy grumps by now?”

Emma snorted in spite of herself, and crossed her arms in an attempt to continue looking at least halfway annoyed. Unfortunately, the smile on Regina’s face told her that this battle was lost before it even began.

“Your Emma,” Emma echoed with a poorly-hidden blush and a smile. “So cheesy.”

“You’re cheesy,” Regina said, gently running a thumb over Emma’s cheekbone. “That’s why you like it. You know”—she pulled her face closer, their lips barely touching—“I do feel bad about Christmas Eve, but...we don’t need a holiday to spend time together as a family, Emma.”

“I know,” Emma sighed, closing the space between them for just a moment as her heart swelled. “It’s stupid. I know I’m being silly or ridiculous or whatever, but I was just...really looking forward to it.”

Regina bit her lip, her eyes trailing from Emma’s lips to her clear, blue eyes. “I know,” she whispered. To the untrained ear, it was a simple statement, thoughtless even. But Emma caught the words unsaid in Regina’s quiet confession, as she so often did, and smiled.

“I know how you can make it up to me,” Emma said with a smirk.

“Oh?” Regina raised her brow, the beginnings of a salacious smirk playing on the edge of her lips. She tugged lightly at the edge of Emma’s collar, inching her ever-slightly closer. “Shall we head upstairs then?”

Emma leaned in once more toward her waiting lips, but paused, a hair’s breadth away—her eyes shone mischievously as she gazed into Regina’s dark eyes—and smirked. “I was going to ask for a lasagna, but I guess you have something better in mind.”

 

 

 


	5. A Swan-Mills Christmas Eve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emma and Henry spend a lovely Christmas Eve together.

Emma and Henry huddled together under a warm blanket by the fireplace, half-empty mugs of hot chocolate in hand. It was late in the evening on Christmas Eve and, exhausted by their activities of the day, decided there was no better way to celebrate than watching  _Elf._

Normally, Emma would be as focused as Henry, dropping bits of popcorn all over the blanket or dribbling bits of hot chocolate if she snorted too hard when she laughed. Instead, Emma—sentimental on this holiday—thought about how much she loved the way her son’s body vibrated against hers as he laughed, and the way he didn’t mind her fingers in his hair. 

Her son. She still couldn’t believe she was right here with her son. She couldn’t believe she could be so happy, so safe, so warm, and so loved. Right here in her everyday. Sure, she would’ve loved to be watching the movie with her head in Regina’s lap too, but Emma told herself to be reasonable. To be grateful for the boy on her shoulder, and not demand more than that. Besides, Regina had given more than enough.

This morning, Emma and Henry had woken up to the smell of a big pancake breakfast. There were bowls of berries and cream, bottles of syrup, and a tub of rocky road ice cream just for Emma. “I’ll never understand why you’d want ice cream on your pancakes, Emma,” Regina—a vision in her red, silk bathrobe—had sighed. “But you do look adorable when you enjoy them so much. Happy Christmas Eve, dear.”

"Thank you," Emma said with a grin. "This looks amazing. You look amazing." Emma gathered Regina into her arms and kissed her passionately. She could see Henry in her peripheral, calmly shielding his eyes as he dropped a spoonful of blueberries on his pancakes. With a grin, she pressed the kiss further, until Regina’s shaking hands pressed into her shoulder and gently pushed her back. “Emma, please control yourself in front of our son,” she said, biting her lip in an altogether unconvincing way.

Emma’s smile could not get wider when she leaned in toward Regina’s pouting lips. “Our son”—god, how she loved the sound of that—“will be fine. Right, Hen?”

Henry grabbed his plate and moved to sit as far away from his mothers as possible. “Please don’t talk to me while you’re kissing. It’s gross enough as it is,” he mumbled. He kept his eyes down, and nonchalantly cut into his stack of pancakes and began the feast on his own with the slightest hint of a smile on his lips.

As much as he pretended to be disgusted by his mothers’ affection for each other, he was happy for them too. After all, they’d come a long way together.

After breakfast, Emma and Henry went to the park while Regina went off to work. The snow hadn’t quite built up this year, but they enjoyed the frosty air as they strolled through the familiar path hand-in-hand.

“You want some ice cream, mijo?” Emma said, swinging their arms slightly.

Henry raised an eyebrow. “It’s not the same when you call me that,” he said. “And, you just had ice cream. For breakfast.”

“Why I never!” Emma cried, affecting terrible hurt with her free hand pressed to her chest. “Just because I’m not a sexy Spanish speaker.”

“I don't know if you know this, Ma, but you’re kind of a white lady,” Henry deadpanned. "Just not the same." 

Emma laughed, and let go of their hands to wrap an arm around Henry’s shoulder—he stumbled closer with a mild look of annoyance, but wrapped an arm around Emma’s waist anyway. “Alright, kid. I can’t argue with that,” Emma declared. “I’ll leave the Spanish to the hot Latina in the family. But we’re totally getting ice cream.”

After a late post-ice cream lunch at Granny’s, the pair decided to drop by Regina’s office with a warm apple pie. Regina had looked up, her glasses falling slightly down the curve of her nose, so attractive that Emma could only stand there with the box in her hands, gaping like an idiot no matter how many times she’d stood in that exact same spot. It was only when Henry nudged her in the rib that Emma scrambled to place the white box on Regina’s desk, smiling nervously all the while—the slow smirk forming on Regina’s face was simply too much.

Henry opened the box to reveal the pie. On top of the golden pastry was a message scribbled on a napkin with red and blue crayons. Regina picked up the napkin carefully with both hands and unfolded the sheet. “To Regina,” she read, her voice trailing into a soft gasp as she continued reading, “the best Mom in the world.” She glanced up at Emma and Henry’s expectant faces with glittering eyes. “Merry Christmas, and lots of love. We’ll be waiting for you at home.”

“Forever yours,” Emma recited, “Emma and Henry.”

Regina sniffed, and wiped away a tear as delicately as she could without smudging her make-up. “You two,” she began, standing up from her desk and opening her arms wide. “Come here.”

Emma and Henry broke into matching grins, and nearly dove into her open arms, engulfing Regina into a big hug. At one point, Emma picked her up off the ground, earning a slap on the shoulder from Regina and a burst of laughter from Henry.

“I love you, Regina,” she whispered into her hair as she tightened her embrace.

She felt Regina’s smile against her skin. “I love you too, Emma.”

Then, breaking apart, the two women turned to engulf Henry in a hug. “I love you, mijo,” Regina said, for what felt like the first time all over again.

“I love you too, Henry,” Emma added, ruffling his hair.

“I don’t know why you’re both so mushy today,” Henry mumbled, “but I love you guys too, I guess.”

Later, when the three were happily eating around Regina’s desk, Regina regarded the half eaten slice of pie on her plate with a curious quirk of her brow. “As much as I love this, why apple pie?”

Henry shrugged, and pointed at Emma with his fork. “Ma’s idea.”

Emma replied with a mysterious smile, “Just thought we could make some new memories. It's not quite a turnover, but pies are easier to share.”

After a quick dinner of mac and cheese out of a box, Emma and Henry opted for a quiet evening in. They cut up a few more snowflakes through a karaoke marathon of Christmas carols, then quieted down as Henry read a few of his favourite Christmas stories to Emma—some even of his own creation. She even attempted to create her own stories, and though they weren’t very good, she didn’t mind Henry teasing her. After all, maybe it was true that “Regina’s eyes were like a beautiful pair of eyes” was kind of a crappy simile. “It’s the thought that counts,” Emma had defended.

“Sure, Ma,” Henry said with a smirk. “Mom will love it.”

It had been a long, but thoroughly rewarding day. Maybe even the best day of Emma’s life.

And now here they were, at the end of the day, bundled up together on the couch. The credits rolled up as Henry’s breathing evened out against Emma’s shoulder. Emma’s eyelids got heavier. She laid her head on Henry’s, and allowed herself—warm and comfortable beside her son—to lean into sleep.

At a quarter to midnight, Regina came home. She dropped everything onto the floor, right there in the foyer, and rushed upstairs, calling for Emma and Henry. When her search finally led her to the living room, she stopped. The firelight flickered an orange glow on two sleeping faces.

“Mom?” Henry murmured, slowly raising his head as he rubbed his eyes. Emma’s head lolled back onto the back of the couch, her lips slightly parted as she continued to sleep.

“Hello, mijo,” she whispered. Henry shuffled back to welcome her into the space between him and Emma under the blanket. Regina smiled, and carefully lowered herself onto the couch without disturbing Emma. Henry wrapped his arms around her waist and laid his head on her lap, almost instantly falling back to sleep. Just as Regina tucked the blanket around Henry’s shoulders, she felt something warm snake around her torso, pulling her backward against the couch.

“Regina,” Emma mumbled sleepily, her breath hot in Regina’s ear. “Welcome home.”

She tucked her head into the crook of Regina’s neck, and snuggled closer. Regina smiled, and tucked Emma’s hair behind her ear. She planted a quick kiss on her forehead, and felt so intensely warm and loved in that moment, that she could only sigh and take it all in. Never in her life had she expected happiness to be so easy.

As the clock struck midnight, she closed her eyes. “Merry Christmas.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays everyone! Thank you very much to all of you supporting this story so far. This has been a lot of fun to write.  
> I hope all of you will have a wonderful and warm holiday season this year!
> 
> The Swan-Mills Family will be returning soon!


End file.
